Two Geniuses in MiddleEarth
by CrystalFNfire
Summary: Every time someone falls into Middle Earth, they always seem to have some kind of physical advantage over others. What if, instead, they had only their heads to aid them?
1. Prologue

**Prologue

* * *

**

"Ow," Desi groaned, and even in pain, she managed to sound sarcastic. "That hurt." She stood and brushed herself off, rubbing her backside and grimacing. "What the—" She had taken the liberty to look around, and found that she was not where she had been.

"Where are we?" The young man next to her had managed to stand too. He spoke more to himself, however, than to her. His eyes narrowed behind his horn-rimmed glasses, as he surveyed the scene and whistled.

Both focused on the scene before them, as it unfolded to their disbelieving eyes. They stood on a grassy plain, which blended green, yellow, and brown in a way that Desi did not think possible, but looked marvelous together. At first, she thought she was dreaming, and began rubbing her eyes and pinching herself to see if she was indeed awake. However, the softness of the earth and the itchiness of the grass blowing against her bare legs were too realistic to be any man-made fantasy. A cool breeze blew through her long, black hair, and she shivered in her summer wear. Other than the sky and the distant mountains, nothing else was on the plain except for what loomed directly in front of the two.

A gargantuan white… Desi grasped for words… city, it seemed, was lunging out from one side of the cliffs of the mountain range behind it. The glaring brilliance of the structure contrasted sharply with the black basalt rocks of the mountain. _Was that a basalt mountain?_ Desi wondered, and squinted. The pores made it look so. It was built like a tower out of fairytales: tall, with the highest peak as the back of the white city.

The entire place itself was also quite fairy-tale-like. The towers of the city rose in circles, each one smaller than the next, and guard towers could be seen on each level, though they were at different places, never in a straight line. The city did not seem so much like a building made by man, but a piece of stone carved by nature itself in the mountains. Counting the levels, Desi made out seven. In conveyed in her heart a sense of awe and wonder, as if looking upon something old and venerable. She felt as she had when she had gone back to China with her family and looked upon the Forbidden City and the Ming Tombs.

Carlos must have felt the same, for he whistled again. "We're not in Kansas anymore, Toto."

The very air here was different—sweeter and sharper, but in a way, more wholesome. Desi could feel the change in climate as well, shivering in the cool zephyrs but welcoming it at the same time. It was definitely more humid, but almost anywhere was more humid than dry and arid Southern California. It seemed that the short-sleeve top and capris Desi had chosen for a sultry, July afternoon would not be appropriate here.

"Wherever we are, it still seems like Earth, right?" the girl joked, but her warm, brown eyes, usually sparkling and laughing, were doubtful. To these high schoolers, who had only traveled abroad during summer vacations, this seemed as alien as Mars.

Flicking another glance around, Carlos raised an eyebrow and answered, "If you just count the sky and grass." Everything else stood still in an unrealistic way. This illusion, however, was soon broken.

Bells chimed in the distance, and the two looked up at the city once again. The sun shone lazily to their far left, breaking through the clear, blue sky. Morning, Desi guessed, had come upon the city. Carlos dropped the humor and flat out panicked. "Okay. Where the hell are we, and how did we get here?"

Desi thought, and tried to answer this question. One of her main faults was thinking too much.

* * *


	2. Chapter 1

**Chapter 1

* * *

**

It had been a regular July afternoon, and, she remembered, she had been bored. Summer vacation was great, especially after junior year, when one knew that next year, she would be an upperclassman and dominate the school. But, in truth, the dynamic and fun that she got at the beginning of vacation in mid-June only lasted so long, as she had a job and needed to take care of her mother and five-year-old sister when she wasn't counting up the change in the cash register at Wal-Mart.

Basically, by the end of July, she was flat out tired and just wanted to start school again. Perhaps it would have been better if she had been able to go work for the NSA and crack codes like she had originally planned. However, only three percent of the US population actually knew what the NSA was, and because she was only seventeen when she sent in her job application, the organization had become alarmed. They wrote back that they did not care how smart or experienced she was, she had to have at least a graduate degree.

Desi did not understand that theory, as the NSA recruited a number of bright, young minds every year. Why not hers, no matter her age? What was age but a number anyway? As long as she could decode North Korean war messages that threatened the US society, why did they care how old she was?

But anyway, despite, her 170 IQ, she was denied even a job interview. It was true that she had finally read some good books she had piled up for a long time, but really, there was only so much time she could spend with her nose in a book.

But finally, Sunday had come, and her mother was home so she was free of Haley for a few hours. She had lazed around, reading _Macbeth_, her favorite Shakespeare play, a tenth time, and then moved on to Milton's _Paradise Lost_. Then, she was bored.

Being seventeen, free, and bored, she called Carlos. Normally, she would have just gone over to his house and barged into his room, but because of his recent girlfriend, she was loath to do this, as she might intrude on something she rather not see.

The two had been best friends since Desi had moved to Southern California when she was eight. Though they an unlikely pair, they had become inseparable when she had responded to roll with, "I am that merry wanderer of the night."

A boy with dirty blonde hair and green eyes in the back of the class promptly laughed and said, "Either I mistake your shape and making quite/Or else you are that shrewd and knavish sprite/Call'd Robin Goodfellow." She could not believe that another of her age had read Shakespeare's _A Midsummer Night's Dream_.

From then on, they had become best friends, always trying to out-quote each other, or stump the other with a homemade code. In fact, she was currently working on one of his, but had not yet come to any conclusions.

When he heard her voice over the line, she could nearly feel his smug grin through the phone line. "Give up?" was his first greeting.

"You wish," she challenged. "Bet I could figure it out within two minutes of opening it." This was a lie, as she had opened the e-mail last night and had stayed up until midnight trying to figure it out. She had a decoder on her computer, where she could use brute force and break the code, but it was more fun to do it with paper and pencil. Carlos knew this, and never gave her one that she could not figure out unless she used a computer. Desi, on the other hand, was free to make up any code she wanted to because he loved using technology.

The message looked like this:

"8-6, 2-2, 3-5, 2-2, 1-4, 12-3, 2-2, 6-3, 3-5, 6-3, 10-1, 2-3, 2-2, 5-2, 5-2, 8-6, 2-2, 1-4, 1-4, 2-2, 1-1, 2-2, 8-6, 3-5, 9-1, 12-5, 7-3, 2-2, 1-4, 9-1,2-2, 2-2, Q, 2-3, 12-1, 6-3, 7-3, 5-2, 12-1, 7-3, 1-4, 2-2, 3-5, 5-2, 4-4, 11-8, 4-4, 10-1, 5-2, 11-8, 5-1, 12-3, 1-4, 12-3, 8-6, 10-1, 11-8, 9-1, 11-3, 7-3, 9-1, 11-8, 4-4, X."

And under it, was,

"DRGSLFG DZC, XZIOLH."

She had been baffled at first, but that was her first reaction to all of Carlos's made-up codes these days. Most of his things were poems or couplets or something bad he made up himself. Though he was a language genius, speaking almost all Latin-based languages fluently and being able to wag his tongue in what Chinese Desi had taught him, he was horrible at creating his own poetry.

"You are a horrible liar," Carlos laughed. "So what's on your mind?"

"I'm not lying," Desi protested, but secretly, she smiled that he was able to guess her feelings so quickly. "And I'm bored _out_ of my mind." That, at least, was true. In reality, she had gotten the upper half of the code, which was what looked like the harder part. All she had to do was find the letters according to the months of the year. The second number indicated which letter it was in the month's name. For example, 7-3 was L. (Ju _l_ y.)

She had ended up with lines of letters of nonsense.

"TEHEUCENHNOBEAATEUUEJETHSMLEUSEEQBDNLADLUEHAIRIOARACUCTORSVLSRIX."

However, she soon realized there were sixty-four letters in the message and decided to run the Julius Caesar box on it. Magically, the letters appeared in an eight-by-eight box:

TEHEUCEN

HNOBEAAT

EUUEJETH

SMLEUSEE

QBDNLADL

UEHAIRIO

ARACUCTO

RSVLSROX

Reading it down and across and adding spaces, it became,

"The square number should have been a clue,

Julius Caesar created it on the loo."

The "X" was just a fill in. Even so, Desi shook her head at this nonsense, but the next part gave her a headache through the entire night. She had not slept well because she could not decipher it. Actually, the code was relatively easy. Each letter corresponded to another at the opposite end of the alphabet (A was Z and B was Y), but the message was even more inane than the couplet that preceded it.

"Without wax, Carlos."

That was all. She had no idea what it meant. She had tried nearly everything, but that was the only method that proved to make words that even spelled anything. Anything else just gave her a bundle of letters.

"Well, if I believed you then, I certainly don't _now_," the phone crackled as Carlos laughed again. He had a pleasant baritone, and Desi remembered when other boys had picked him on because he had been a squeaky falsetto until the end of their sophomore year. Then, he had still had his braces and plaid sweaters, but thanks to his last visit with the orthodontist and a new wardrobe that his mother insisted on, he was now only plagued with retainers, blue jeans, and normal T-shirts. Of course, a summer of lap swimming and joining the school swim team did not hurt his physique. That had led him to suddenly change to be one of the most longed for boys in their high school, and this year, found himself with Clara, the head cheerleader.

Desi was silent for a moment. She still believed that Clara was just using Carlos to get back at her boyfriend for three years, the center of the varsity basketball team. But this was a touchy issue with Carlos, who was very protective of his first girlfriend, and Desi did not want to break the news to him. "Your verse is horrible," she finally said jokingly, letting him in on the ruse. "Julius Caesar did _not_ make up the Caesar Square in the loo."

"He could have. Besides, being a tyrant and everything, where do you think he has the time to think of stuff like this? Wanna come over?"

She loved how he was a genius with language, and could still stand to make deliberate grammar mistakes. "I was wondering when you were going to ask. Yes, thank you. Be there in a minute." She was telling the truth again, as he lived across the street. It was quite convenient since she still did not have her own car.

Her thoughts trailed back to Carlos and Clara, and she found herself wrinkling her nose in disgust. Ask her three years ago, and she would have laughed in the face of whoever told her that her best friend would soon be dating the "hottest" girl in school. Of course, perhaps her theories were biased by the fact that when she first laid eyes on Clara in third grade, she had hated her guts. The girl was an incorrigible flirt and had the equivalent brains to a doorknob that had not been used for the past three centuries. However, that flaw was covered up by a foot of luxurious blonde hair, always perfect in a way that Desi would never learn how, brilliant blue eyes, and a smile that could disarm a guard at Buckingham Palace. The fact that she was an amazing actress, dancer, and cheerleader only made her more popular.

Desi would not have despised Clara as much if she had not been the first of the three. Because of her looks, Clara had been able to secure more lead roles than Desi, though she could not understand how anyone could stomach the other girl's repeated character role after role. Clara never played anyone other than the swooning, histrionic heroine, but unfortunately, with the musicals that her high school usually put on, this role was in high demand. Desi tried to tell herself that her brains would be more valued than Clara's looks, but somehow, that theory was failing.

The theory seemed especially stupid when Carlos, her best friend, one whom she thought was immune to pretty girls, fell head over heels for Clara. This annoyed Desi endlessly, and she could not see how the two would get along, Clara with her Covergirl secrets and Carlos with his own ideas about Einstein's theory of relativity. Closing her eyes, she tried to block all thoughts of the couple out of her mind.

After five minutes, in which she had almost been hit by a car while jay walking, said hi to Mrs. Porter, her neighbor, and given Mrs. Miller, Carlos's mother, a hug, she arrived in Carlos's room. Carlos, though extremely smart with a brain like a storage cabinet the size of Texas, was not physically organized. While all his thoughts seemed to be put away neatly on shelves and could be taken out and examined any time, his room was in an order of disarray. Half of the time, Desi wondered how he ever picked his way to go to bed. She was sure a bed was there somewhere under the piles of dirty clothes and collection of graduate level physics books.

At the far end of the room was a computer desk beneath a large, uncurtained window, where the afternoon sun streamed in. The computer, like always, was on, and the monitor was displaying a complex screen saver of matrix digits that she was sure Carlos had made himself. The girl breathed a sigh of relief, welcoming the cool air; Carlos's room was the only one in the house with air conditioning, and while fans were stationed all over, Mrs. Miller managed to keep the house at a baking 102º. (That was what it said on the hallway thermostat.)

The rest of the room consisted of a bookshelf on the left wall, a bureau next to the bookshelf, and a closet at the wall next to the door. The bed, or what looked like one, occupied the right wall. The walls were covered with posters of the periodic table, the Lord of the Rings, and a complex blue print of something Carlos was working on. An entire wall was covered with a huge sheet of butcher paper so if the boy suddenly got a genius idea, he could write it down immediately.

She stepped cautiously through the doorway, thankful she had remembered her thick-soled boots; no one ever took their shoes off in Carlos's room. Sure enough, as soon as she stepped in, something crunched beneath her foot.

"Oops," Desi sighed. "Sorry." It seemed like she broke something every time she was in here. It had become a tradition.

The boy shrugged. "It was just an empty soda can," and walked past her. He was so use to her stepping on his possessions that he actually put stuff on the floor that he did not want. From experience, she knew it could have easily been anything from a cell phone to a robotic childhood toy.

"An _empty_ soda can? That's when you throw the thing away, Carlos."

Carlos fell into his chair, a plush Laz-E-Boy. Desi knew that he spent so much time in front of his computer that he needed to be comfortable. "Please," he groaned. "I already have one mother. I don't need another."

Desi picked up the soda can and then picked up a few more trash items and dumped them into large wastepaper basket next to the door. "Well, that _one_ doesn't seem able to keep your habitat clean," she laughed, and then took a pile of dirty clothes off the bed and went out of the room to dump them in the hamper. When she came back through the door, she sat down on the space she had cleared on the mattress and commented, "I swear, if I didn't come in here at least once a week, you'd die of suffocation in your own clothes."

The boy just looked up at his ceiling and sighed exasperatedly. This routine had been going on for the past nine years, when Desi first stepped into his house. "So, I hear you're bored," he tried to change the subject. He had put on his "boyfriend" voice that Desi knew he used around Clara.

She snorted and pulled her knees up, sitting cross-legged. "Do you know how stupid you sound using that voice?"

"I thought it made me sound more manly. Anyway, Clara likes it."

Desi suddenly became vehement and said bitterly, "If Clara told you she like men with large breasts and female genitalia, would you become a transsexual for her?" Her best friend gave her a hurt and confused look, and she immediately felt guilty. "I'm sorry," she sighed and looked away. "But you know I don't like her, and I just—"

"Look, she's my first girlfriend, and I really want to make this work, okay?" he suddenly cut in. "I wish you two would just give it a rest." He had an exasperated tone in his voice, and Desi knew that she should not push it further.

"I know," she told him. "I'm sorry, but I care about you Carlos. I just don't think she was a wise choice as a first girlfriend, alright?"

He leaned back into his chair and turned to face her. "You said that at the beginning of the year, and we're still together," he pointed out. She was glad that his voice held no bitterness. He was just stating a fact, and she knew it was true and could not complain. They had stayed together for longer than Desi expected, but that did not make her like Clara anymore.

Desi smoothed out the sheets behind her and pushed aside all the little trinkets that Carlos needed for some new machine that was probably in the garage, unfinished and unrecognizable. Then, she fell back, letting the cool sheets surround her. She deiced that she should stop beating the dead horse and changed the subject again. "What do you think normal people do during summer vacation?"

Carlos seemed relieved that she had decided to move on. "Normal people? You mean that we're not normal?" She looked over and saw his grin.

"Oh, _please_," she turned back to face the ceiling. "How many normal people do you know that make up couplets about Julius Caesar and what he made up while constipating?"

Suddenly, something next to Desi's head spewed out a few measures of the Waltz of the Flowers. She jumped and snatched up the thing, she looked at it furiously. It turned out to be a cell phone. Frustrated, she glanced over at Carlos, whose face had suddenly been overcome by a look of horror, and decided that she wanted to see who was calling.

Flipping open the over, she saw the name, "Clary," and Desi's eyebrows flew straight up. A laugh bubbled at the edge of her tongue as her friend grabbed the phone from her and punched the answer button with an angry finger. He gave her a death look, but the voice that flowed from his lips was melodious.

"Hey, how you doing?" he asked the phone, and Clara obviously said something positive, as he answered, "Oh, that's great." Then, she asked something, and an amused look came over his face. "Oh, sure," he said into the phone, and gave Desi a triumphant look. "Come on over. Desi's just leaving."

Then, it was the girl's turn to look triumphant. She knew where he had gone wrong, and watched as the smile slid off his face as if it were melted ice cream. "No!" he protested. "No! We're just friends, Clara, seriously. Look, I just—"

Obviously, Clara had hung up, as he looked into the phone dejectedly, a confused look on his face. Then, he turned to Desi imploringly. She had been the one giving him tips on how to win girls for years. She just smiled, and the laugh that had been in her throat slid out. "Oh, Carlos," she shook her head. "When are you going to learn _tact_?" Then, pointing at the cell phone, she added, "And when did Clara become," she added in a cute baby voice, "_Clary?_" She snorted again. "Is it because it rhymes with fairy?"

The boy threw the cell phone back on the bed and sat down on the bed next to Desi, putting his head in his hands. "I don't get it. What the hell did I say this time?" She swore that under his breath, he muttered, "_Women_."

She lay back again, and said, "You _told_ her that I was here. She hates my guts as much as _I_ hate hers, and of course, being her boyfriend, you're not supposed to entertain any girls alone. So now, she's jealous."

Carlos sputtered. "What?! But… but… my mother is downstairs! Besides. Even if she wasn't, we wouldn't do anything. We've been best friends since we were eight. She knows that nothing would happen between us."

Desi sat looked down at him, and smiled again at his naïveté. "She obviously doesn't and thinks the worst. You're going to have to talk to her now." When he reached for the cell phone again, she stopped him. "No. Wait. Let her cool down first. All you'll get if you call her now is a slap in the face."

The boy threw up his hands and lay back next to the girl. "Wow," Carlos said. "I didn't realize it, but I'm bored now too." He observed his own hands and said, "Yet here's a spot/Out damned spot, out I say!… What, will these hands never be clean?" He snorted at his own corniness as he tried to rub away the pen mark on his palm.

Desi rolled over onto her stomach. "You make a better Lady Macbeth than I do," she commented. She had been Shakespeare's cruelest female character when the school had put on _Macbeth_ for a Halloween play.

"Oh, wait," Carlos suddenly realized something. "I totally forgot. I need to show you something in my mom's closet."

The girl raised an eyebrow. "Er… your mom's closet?"

"Yeah. I didn't have any other place to store it, so she let me put it there. I just finished it last night." Being naturally curious, she had went with him, but as soon as they stepped through the huge walk-in closet doors, they had ended up in the unknown place.

****

Desi looked around once again and felt panic rise up in her. Her heart skipped a beat and she had to take a deep breath to calm herself. "I'm guessing this is not what you wanted to show me, huh?" she laughed nervously, aware of how close she was to becoming hysterical. When Carlos did not respond, she added, "Okay. Show and tell over. Let's get out of here."

"And go where?" her best friend asked, turning. "Where the _hell_ are we supposed to go?!" When Carlos was edgy, he cursed or invented things. This did not seem like one of his creative moments.

"Well, we got here through your mom's closet," Desi answered thoughtfully, ever the mathematician. "Logically, we can just turn around and go back."

"That is absolute _shit_," the boy spat out. "If we didn't use logic to get in, there is no way we can use logic to get out. It is just not _logical_ for us to step into my mother's closet and wind up anywhere but among a pile of clothing." Then, he let out a long string of curses under his breath. This usually meant he was thinking.

Desi rolled her brown eyes, trying to remain cool, but her head was boiling with thoughts and panic. If math didn't work, what else did she have to turn to? Math had been her _life_. Yes, there were other things, but when they didn't work, math was always there, solid, unchanging. There was only one right answer all the time, either you got it or you didn't. But it was still there. Finally, she realized that she could not stand Carlos's cursing any more, and decided she had to butt in. "Will you be quiet for a second? Even if it's not logical, I still want to see if I can go back or not."

She turned around and raised her leg to take a step back, but before she could carry out this brilliant plan, however Carlos grabbed her arm and pointed to the white city. "Seven circles," he mused as she turned to face the white structure again. "What does that look like to you?"

Desi brushed him off. "Some people who like to show off. It's no—" Only then did she _look_ at the building and figure out why her friend was still gaping. "It can't be," she breathed in awe and fear. "No, it's not—"

"Yeah, it has to."

"It looks nothing like in the movies!"

"You think people in movies have seen this place?!"

"Oh God… it can't. Could it be—?"

"The White City? Minas Tirith? Maybe."

* * *


	3. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2

* * *

**

"For the last time, Carlos, it's impossible!" the girl cried exasperatedly. Her long, black hair had fallen out of its loose ponytail during the argument, and her narrowed almond-shaped eyes clearly showed her contempt of Carlos's theory. In the moonlight, she looked almost eerie, like a dark goddess of ancient times, the pale light making her skin look white and her hair the deepest of ebony.

"You're the math whiz here," the boy pointed out. "According to statistics, _nothing_ is impossible." He again uploaded his palm pilot, hooked it to the cell phone cable, and tried to connect to the Internet. Both were out in the gardens of the Silent Street, at the very top of Minas Tirith, under the ink black night sky. The stars shone lazily around the waxing gibbous moon, but nothing gave more light than the angry fires of Orodruin in the distance, cursing the gods with its rumblings and groans.

Other than that, their surroundings were pitch black, the only lights coming faintly from guard towers. The outpost at Osgiliath was a mere shadow near the sparkling river Anduin, which reflected the moonlight. It clattered noisily, as if defying the silence at Minas Tirith and allying with the deafening din of machinery in Mordor. The Pelennor Fields were silent and eerie.

"This has nothing to do with stats," Desi said. "It's logic. To use the Internet, you have to have satellites, a modem, and other computers to link to! Who cares if it's night?!" Carlos had said that satellite signals worked better at night. "There _are_ no signals for you to receive, and what if we get _caught_?!" The Silent Street was a much-revered place in Gondor because it held the White Tree, the symbol of the King. However, it was now withered and dead, as the king had not returned to the throne in over an age.

"Don't worry," the boy grinned over the glowing screen of his palm pilot. His spirits were high again, because his brain was ticking. "If we do, we just pretend to be a young couple star-gazing on their honeymoon."

Desi rolled her eyes and crossed her arms, pacing with the little room that the wires trailing form the back of the palm pilot to the cell phone gave her. She was holding the cell phone, moving the antenna, trying to get a signal. "This is war, Carlos. No one gets married and goes on a honeymoon in times of war. Besides, everyone knows the Silent Street is off limits to everyone except Guards of the Citadel and the Steward."

Suddenly, the boy gripped the edges of the palm pilot with shaking hands, the pen dangling uselessly from the sides, looking like a doomed bungee jumper. The intake of his breath was sharp and quick so that Desi could distinctly hear the hiss of air that moved through his teeth.

"What is it?" the girl immediately asked, moving a hand to his shoulder to look over at the screen of the palm pilot. When she finally looked, she was understood. "You suck, Carlos," she stuck her tongue out at her best friend.

He laughed and beckoned for her to walk out with him farther on the Silent Street so that they were directly beneath the fountain, where the White Tree was. "A hundred and seventy IQ, and all you can do to insult me is to stick your tongue out?" he teased. She sniffed and pretended to raise her nose in the air.

That time, like always, the Internet had not worked and a white screened showed with the huge words, "Page cannot be displayed," flashing at the top. Desi was beginning to be sick of this ruse, and decided to call it quits for the night. "Look, Carlos," she told her friend. "Face it, okay? We are in Middle-Earth. I don't know what time it is, but we're in the midst of the War of the Ring. There are no satellites and there is definitely no Internet or phone signal. We are at an age when people still think that the catapult is a new invention!"

Her friend looked up with an annoyed look on his face. Her teasing and nay-saying usually did not get to him, as he knew that she was merely joking and that doubting him usually pushed him forward. However, now, when he was anxious for some connection to his own world, her doubting did not help, as deep down in his heart, he knew she was right.

"All I'm saying is that if we got here, there must be some way that others have been here too," he said through gritted teeth. "Just give me a chance, will you?" Desi backed off, drawing the cloak around her shoulders closer and still holding the cell phone. The night air had begun to get colder as the moon rose, and to mix in, the two had had to dress as common citizens. Carlos had traded his summer wear with a man who had found his clothing strange and appealing. He was now wearing the other man's dark green tunic, a brown belt, brown hose, and soft, velvet black boots that fit his feet perfectly.

Desi eyed the tunic that came to mid-thigh and wanted to make some snide remark about the hose, which was more like tights, but really could not. She found that Carlos had been working out lately (for Clara, of course, she thought hastily) and that his swimmer legs did not actually look bad in the leggings. She was very glad that the tunic was not shorter, as she had seen on others.

Despite Carlos's luck, Desi had not found any men or women that liked her clothes (she did not know why, as she had on her favorite T-shirt and the capris had been very flattering of her figure) and would trade. Instead, she settled with "borrowing" a stray cloak that she found on a barstool in one of the many inns that they had discovered. It must have been belonged to a short but burly man, as it was the perfect length for her but she felt as if she was swimming in it.

Now that the sun had set, she was very glad for it, as it was warm but light. Carlos still would not speak to her, so she turned her back, changing the cell phone from her left hand to her right, and looked up at the stars. She found that she barely recognized any of the constellations, but the Milky Way galaxy was still firmly in place, dragging out in that beautiful streak across the sky. She found the stars comforting, though she could not name them now, and felt more at home among them than with the rest of Minas Tirith.

Another sharp intake of breath from Carlos caught her attention, but before she got herself too excited, she remembered the time before. "Oh please, Carlos," she rolled her eyes. "'Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame one me,' remember?" She turned back to gazing at the stars and wrapped the cloak even tighter around herself as an icy blast cut across her face.

"No," her best friend's voice was urgent. "I swear it, Desi. This is not even funny. I'm online."

"Yahoo or Google?" she asked sarcastically and did not bother to shift her gaze.

"Desi, I'm being serious," Carlos confirmed. "I'm seriously online. Why do you think anyone would install satellites here? And how?!"

The girl only rolled her eyes. Her arms were still crossed, and she had forgotten she was gripping the cell phone. "I don't know. Maybe people in Middle-Earth feel the need to connect to each other," she shrugged. "You know, they need to find information too. How do you think Gandalf knows so much about the Ring? He must have hacked into Sauron's personal computer. And anyway, there's always 'Ask Bilbo Baggins.'"

The boy made an exasperated sound and shoved the palm pilot in front of her face. At first, she could not believe her eyes. Then, she gasped and nearly dropped the cell phone. "But… Carlos…" she said weakly, finally believing him. "You couldn't have… this is the government's files. How did you--?"

"Hacked in, of course."

"You _actually _hacked into the government's top secret files in _five_ minutes?!"

Carlos looked sheepish. "Well, you know. I mean, the shields weren't that hard to get through. I mean, the main question is why there's Internet and government files to hack into in Middle-Earth anyway!"

Desi suddenly laughed and took the palm pilot away from him. "You misunderstand me," she smiled coyly. "I meant that it actually took you five _whole_ minutes to get into the government's top secret files?! That's gotta be your all-time slowest record."

Carlos face turned red. "Just… just click on the second to last file, alright?!" He was trying not to show his anger, but Desi laughed again, and gave his shoulder a quick squeeze.

The look on her face when she saw it, however, was more than enough compensation for his anger. "But… _what_?! This _can't_ be!" She then made a serious of inarticulate sounds and suddenly, laughed hysterically. "The government sending probes and satellites back in time," she gibbered to herself. "Oh… that's _great_! Just _great_!!!"

* * *


	4. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3

* * *

**

"But _why_?!!" Desi asked again, still bewildered and exasperated, but her hysteria was gone. She found that these attacks had only started happening when she entered Middle-Earth. The shock, she knew, had not set in yet, and she was using her humor to play it off until her mind really grasped that she and Carlos were stuck in Middle-Earth, a land of legends.

She and Carlos had climbed down from the Silent Street, as the peak of Minas Tirith was getting very windy and cold. Desi guessed that it must have been late winter or early spring in Gondor, as even the old peasant cloak she had donned was not much help now that it was nearly midnight. Her best friend did not seem to be any better, as the plain tunic and hose were thin.

"I don't _know_," Carlos answered, leaning against the stone column and resting the back of his head against the cool marble. They were now at the fifth level of the citadel, and both were extremely annoyed at the fact that the gates to each citadel were located on opposite sides of the city. Carlos wondered why J.R.R. Tolkien had made Minas Tirith this way, and realized that perhaps Tolkien had nothing to do with it. Perhaps he had just been the recorder of these events.

The simple locks had been easy to pick, but the guards during this time of war were less susceptible to getting drunk or nodding off. The pair had managed to sneak past the seventh gate, as that was never guarded at night because the Silent Street led to the throne room, which was only used in the daytime. Also, the tomb of the dead kings resided on the seventh pinnacle, and the two had found that the residents of Minas Tirith were very superstitious.

Upon entering Minas Tirith (the guards had barely glanced at their strange attire before letting them in), Carlos had noticed that there were several things wrong with the place. Of course, he had never studied Tolkien closely, but there were a few profound things that he was sure J.R.R. Tolkien had not intended in his writing. For one thing, though Minas Anor (as was the correct name of the city) _was_ white and made of stone, Carlos had always thought that the stone would be like to that of bricks or perhaps cement. However, only the outer walls were made from these materials. Inside, the towers, columns, and even some small guard structures were made from beautiful marble. It needed polishing, yes, but Carlos had never imagined Minas Tirith to be so lavish.

Another thing was the people and how they spoke. They did not speak in some strange accent, as he was sure they would, but in perfect British airs. The peasants' or lower class's accents were certainly closer to that of Lower Cockney, but he had overheard some of the soldiers talking, and if he had not known, he would have thought he was eavesdropping upon a couple of wealthy Englishmen having tea. It was not modern English, certainly, but he had always thought that if the Common Tongue was even _English_, it would at least be flourished with strange vowels and different consonant sounds. When the soldiers talked, their speech was more to the like of 16th-17th century Shakespeare jargon.

The way people dressed were altogether medieval as well, and the feudal codes of the fifteenth century seemed to apply here, though the peasants seemed a great deal happier than he had imagined. The soldiers were not dressed as medieval knights, as their armor was lighter, and their helms had no beaver, but old-fashioned iron plates were still used. Their weapons were not much better than that of medieval ones, as they still carried ridiculously large swords with blades that must have been more than five feet in length and shields that covered nearly their entire body. He admired their strength very much, but the lesson of brains over brawns gave him hope.

Carlos remembered the sixth level guards, who had about as much intelligence as their tankards could hold. After Desi had made a few loud squeaks on her cell phone, they all left the gates unmanned and went off in search of this beeping. The two were able to pick to lock with the Swiss Army knife that Carlos always carried and escape in the wake of the exploring guards. However, the fifth level proved to be a challenge, as six men sat at the gate, all armed and vigilant. The two decided that after their momentous day, they were too tired to continue descending Minas Tirith by trickery. Because of the cold, they found shelter in front of what seemed to be a storage-shed next to a grand edifice surrounded by watchers. It was the only place that they could find that was not inhabited by others.

The shed was packed with spare wood, moldy old bread, and some arms and armory that were in good shape. Though the two were very cold, they were not desperate enough to join the rats in the crumbling shanty. Instead, they reclined outside, next to a tall, marble column, looking idiotic huddled together, their backs to the structure and their sides touching.

"Alright. Let's consider options," Desi spoke up. "Maybe… they want the natural resources."

Carlos shook his head. "If they did, they wouldn't have come here. They'd go back further. Maybe prehistoric times."

"Er… spreading democracy?"

Her friend fixed her with a look of disbelief. "_Please_, Desi. Satellites, Internet, and the obvious billions of dollars that went into this, all for spreading ideas into the past? Come on."

"Well, I'm out of ideas and I _really_ can't think like this!"

He sighed. "We're just speculating here anyway. We're buzzing around the actual thing and not getting anywhere. I have to sleep on this." Desi realized that he had started to shiver, and unbutton the cloak around her neck and spread the material over the both of them. The man that owned it must have been very stout indeed, as they both found sufficient blanketing.

She yawned and beckoned for her friend to lie down next to her. He did, and she folded her arms up under her head, her stomach growling. "Wow," she muttered sleepily. "I'm hungry." Desi knew that Carlos must have felt the same, because all they had eaten today were some beer they had been offered in the taverns and a few pieces of stolen bread in the breadbasket at another inn. She made a mental note to pay them back if she ever got money in this place.

Closing her eyes, she turned on her side, her back to her friend, and using her two hands as a pillow on her cheek.

"What I don't understand is," she remembered Carlos musing as he yawned as well, "is why the U.S. government would side with Sauron and Mordor. I mean, out of the millions of people who work for the government, hasn't one of them read _The Lord of the Rings_? Sauron is supposed to be the bad guy…"

****

The two woke to a dim gray morning with no sun. Desi was not sure what woke her, as the usual bustling of city-dwellers was missing in this majestic white tower. People who still had the nerve to take the streets did so in a hurried manner and tiptoed on soft-booted feet so that they made hardly any noise on the stone floors. Getting up, she realized the downside of sleeping on the cold stone, and grimaced as she rubbed the crick in her neck. Her fingers were red from the sudden surge of blood, and she leaned against the pole and nudged Carlos awake.

"Something's wrong with the people," she muttered sleepily, and groggily rubbed her hands over her face. Carlos was more of a morning person than she was, and as soon as he got the stiffness out of his back, he stood up and began to observe those around them.

Suddenly, the thundering of horse hooves came down the road and a thunderous voice boomed, "Make way! Make way!" Carlos' eyes grew wide at the white figure on the horse and the beautiful gray horse that bore the man. In front of that man was an unmistakable small bundle of furry brown hair and green cloak.

"Holy crap!" he murmured under his breath, and put a hand on the sitting figure of Desi. "Get up! Look at this!"

She groaned and whined a bit, but got up immediately and looked out from behind the column. The figures stormed past and were gone in a blur, but the voice and the white robe could not be mistaken, though the two had never seen this person in their lives before. One look, and she gasped involuntarily. "Oh my God!" she whispered, and Carlos knew that she was surprised, for his best friend never swore or cursed unless it was in Shakespearean language. "That's not…"

"Gandalf the White?" he asked. "And Pippin on Shadowfax? Yes, that sure is."

"Let's go," Desi said, more awake in the morning than she ever was for the past four years. Ignoring her aching muscles and the crick in her neck, she pulled Carlos after her.

* * *


	5. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4

* * *

**

"Ready?" Desi muttered. Carlos nodded, his horn-rimmed glasses already smudged and nearly opaque. He promptly took them off and wiped them on his tunic, and set them back on his nose. His dirty blonde hair stuck up in places where he had slept on, but his green eyes were intent upon his quarry. "Go!"

Just as the doors of Denethor's hall was about to close behind the wizard and the hobbit, the two sprang up from their hiding place behind the statues at the edge of the White Tree and slipped into the steward's hall before the Guards of the Citadel could notice them. Even if they did, the two had moved so quickly, that they could do nothing about it.

Inside, Desi had to blink several times to get use to the brightness. She felt as if she had stepped into some New Age spaceship, as everything except a small chair in the distance was white. Again, she felt this was a deliberate mistake upon the Middle-Earth of Tolkien's creation, as she was sure that in the book, the brilliant author had included color in Gondor's decor.

However, now was not the time to ponder this, as she realized she and Carlos stood out like sore thumbs in the white hall; they could not go back outside even if they wanted. Before them, Gandalf and Pippin were striding the length of the room, where a man swathed in furs sat in a small black chair. The white, gleaming, empty throne behind him was barely visible. In his hands, he held something that was also white. Desi started when she realized that the steward had just been mourning his dead son, Boromir, and was holding his Horn, which was now cleaved in two.

At the sound of disturbance, Denethor looked up, and Desi was suddenly struck dumb. The man before her was like and yet unlike the Denethor she had envisioned and seen in the movies. He was clothed in black fur, which seemed fit for the weather, and his hands glittered with many rings, but that was the end of the resemblance. Desi thought to see someone old and bitter, like the character John Noble had played in Peter Jackson's _The Lord of the Rings_, but instead, she saw a man that looked a great deal younger. In fact, he did not have white hair at all, but shiny black locks that hung from his proud head. If anything, this man was only middle-aged.

His hair was not the only thing that caught Desi's attention however. His eyes were sharp and piercing, but bags under them and his sallow cheeks made him look like he had gone a few nights without sleep. They also made him look older than his years, and red lining around his eyes told her that he had been weeping.

Gandalf and Pippin, though, looked like the ones in her imagination, and indeed, in the likes of Jackson's imagination as well. The wizard was Gandalf the White now, and his snowy robes seemed "correct" as his fairy tale attire more than anything. In fact, Desi thought them completely unnecessary and a nuisance. In weather like this, which constantly foretold rain, his cloak and his leggings must be forever in need of washing. Actually, already, the girl could see mud stains at the bottom of the flowing cloak, and wondered why Gandalf was now wearing his "White" status openly instead of under gray robes like he used to. The staff he leaned upon showed his old age, but Desi could tell the quick step that belied this illusion. She again wondered why this was necessary, as she was sure he could cast magic without it. His hair was shoulder-length and more wild than Desi would have liked, but at least he was not outrageously un-Gandalf-like. In fact, this seemed more realistic, because while traveling, who would cut his hair for him?

Pippin was… well, a hobbit. From her position, she could see his curly hair, elven cloak from Lothlórien, and his hairy feet. There was no mistaking his height, his stoutness despite the months of travel, and the fact that he wore no shoes. He still seemed good-natured enough to be a hobbit, though the girl was sure that he was probably becoming more sobered now, being away from Merry and everything else he knew.

However, the wizard soon interrupted her thoughts. "Hail, Denethor, son of Ecthelion, Lord and Steward of Gondor! I am come with counsel and tidings in this dark hour."

Carlos and Desi exchanged glances at the accuracy of this speech to the actual words in _The Lord of the Rings_. Also, the emphasis that Gandalf had put on the word, "steward," could not be missed.

"Dark indeed is the hour, and at such times you are wont to come, Mithrandir. But though all the signs forebode that the doom of Gondor is drawing nigh, less now to me is that darkness than my own darkness. It has been said that you bring one who saw my son die. Which of these is he?"

Desi gulped as Denethor looked from the face of Gandalf to hers. She suddenly had an uncanny feeling about the steward, and it was not because she was staring at the face of a doomed man. She felt humbled as well as awed, and remembered that Pippin had described him to be more like Aragorn than like Boromir in _The Return of the King_. It dawned on her that his wisdom was what made him look so terrible and great.

Gandalf caught Denethor looking over at the two at the doorway, and turned around much too quickly for a man of his age. His sharp gaze was even more unreadable than the steward's. And his face was different somehow from what Desi had envisioned.

Suddenly, she gasped and reached out for something to hold. Her hand came upon Carlos's arm, and she gripped it tightly. The wizard's gaze seemed to go straight through her, as if he could read her very thoughts. Only after he turned away did she let out her breath and glance over at her best friend. He seemed to have been temporarily stunned by the wizard's glare as well and stood there, breathing hard.

Gandalf's face seemed too dark. It was not right that he should look so. Desi had always thought of him as a kindly grandfather at most times, especially by the way he spoke to the hobbits, but those eyes and the harsh lines around his eyes made him look more like an old witch in Macbeth than anything else.

"It is he," Gandalf turned away from the two, and said to Denethor, indicating a frightened-looking Pippin, who was still staring at the two teenagers near the door. He had turned when the wizard had. "Though who these two others are, I know not."

That turned Denethor's death glare on them. Apparently, the steward had forgotten his grief for his son at the time being. "Come forth," he bellowed, his eyes narrowing. "Why do you not speak, silent ones?"

The girl distinctly heard Carlos gulp and edge her a small nod. She understood his gesture, and they both walked forward, all the while trying not to trip. They stopped when they were even with Gandalf and Pippin, the hobbit having never taken his eyes off of them, and Carlos dropped a stiff bow. Desi curtsied as best as she could without opening her cloak to reveal her ludicrous clothing.

"Hail, Lord Denethor, Steward of Gondor," Carlos spoke in much the same manner as Gandalf. "We are messengers of Rohan and bring you tidings from the Mark."

Desi was impressed at first at this lie, but when she thought about it, she wanted to hit him. She could not believe that he had actually said that, especially with Gandalf and Pippin right next to them. Cursing herself for walking blindly into this plight, she hurriedly tried to think of a way out of this dilemma, but could find none. Already, she could feel the wizard's suspicious gaze on the back of her neck. Swishing her cloak, she stomped on Carlos' foot before he could continue. He threw her an angry look, and by the glare in her eyes, he suddenly realized what he had done. He tried not to grimace, and instead, made a strange face between a smile and a look of pain that Desi would have laughed at if this situation had been less weighty.

Fortunately, Denethor did not notice this. "Thou art children," the steward seemed more interested than suspicious. The broken horn lay in his lap, unattended, and one side was slipping toward the edge of his black robes. "Wherefore does Théoden send children to bear messages? Or has his wits been so addled as to not know how to choose his messengers? Speak, silent one!"

Desi was not at all amused by Denethor's seeming lack of respect for everyone else, but she breathed deeply, realizing that he was talking to her, and did not dare disobey. She bit her lip and tried to speak in the same way that Carlos had done, in an old and polite form of English with a slight British accent mixed with a type of Welsh. "We may be youthful, but we are not children, lord," she tried to be polite, but nevertheless, a hint of resentment tinged her voice. She was glad at least that she did not have to say the word "steward," and almost smiled. Despite all this, she held her head tall, like a proud daughter of the Rohirrim, though in her mind, she though crazily, _What _is_ a proud daughter of the Rohirrim? _ "And we regret to say King Théoden hath not the luxury to spare more able-bodied men as message bearers."

Her last line seemed to intrigue Denethor even more, and as she stepped back, next to Carlos, he demanded. "Stay, you imperfect speaker. Tell me more." Desi's head jerked up so quickly, she thought she was going to get whiplash. Her mouth went dry as she heard this all-too familiar line. Then, realizing she must have looked like an idiot, she tried to keep the surprise off of her face.

Again, she did not disobey, and answered promptly without using lines from Shakespeare, "Surely, lord, you must know that not a fortnight ago, my liege, the King Théoden, did leave his comforts of Meduseld and, with his people, marched to Helm's Deep to meet in battle with the armies of Saruman. With the aid of Mithrandir—" _I'm getting good at this,_ she thought, and inclined her head towards Gandalf "—we did win and treat with the wizard not five days ago. My liege now knows of the treachery of Saruman and the dark motives of the Great Eye in the East. He will not leave Gondor to stand alone against this great tide and will send aid if Gondor will light the beacons."

She paused for breath, though she had spoken slowly because she did not want to say anything that would make her seem omniscient or clairvoyant. Altogether, she was very proud of what she had just said. That speech would have given Carlos, with all his literature trivia and language genius, a run for his money. However, she dared not look at her friend, afraid Gandalf might see this as a last minute scheming resort.

Denethor pondered her words and looked down at the cleaved horn in his lap. Then, he seemed surprised, as if he had not realized it was there, and then, a grim look of mourning came again on his face again.

It was the wizard who spoke, much to Desi's fear and surprise. "Rohirrim messengers, you say you are?" She turned to look at Gandalf and tried not to flinch under his narrowed eyes of icy blue. "How come you so quickly with the mind of the king? And where are your magnificent beasts that bore you hence?"

The girl suddenly found herself rooted to the spot and could not speak. Carlos, always the savior, jumped in and answered, "We left directly after our victory at Helm's Deep. The king then revealed his mind to us only and bade us come hither to speak with the Lord Denethor as he was certain Gondor was in great need of aid. Our horses were stabled only this morning, and we sent a page to warn the steward ere we left the stables. I must say, we were quite surprised to find Shadowfax already there."

Desi wanted to throw her arms around his neck now, as his words meant that Gandalf could have just missed them when he entered Minas Tirith. That would lead to little or no explanation later on, as Gandalf would never be able to discern the Rohirrim horses from the ones that were already there. Being allies, Rohan no doubt gave away horses to Gondor.

"Page?" Denethor seemed to come out of his reverie. "I received no page as a warning for your presence."

"Er… his name was Bergil," the girl added quickly, remembering the name of Pippin's guide in the city later. She hoped that the hobbit would forget and not say anything about them to the kid. "A tall boy for his age. Perhaps ten or eleven."

Gandalf seemed taken aback by this, and, as Desi would learn, she was one of the lucky few to ever see him nonplussed. However, the steward merely nodded, as he seemed to believe their story. "I am familiar with that boy. I know his father well. I do not know why he would neglect his duty so. I shall speak with him." Then, facing the pair of teenagers with a much more friendly look than he had given them before, he inclined his head. "If that is all, you may leave. I must take counsel with these others. Servants shall find a room for thee."

With that, Desi and Carlos were waved off. A young girl showed them to a room on the same level as that of the stewards, and Desi decided that this must be where the king live and kept his guests. She had expected another dazzling white room, but when she entered the chamber, she found it was quite the opposite of Denethor's great hall. It was horribly dark and gloomy, with a large four-poster bed with dusty, blood red curtains in the center. Tables, bureaus, and chairs carved from dark mahogany were scattered everywhere. A stone balcony looked east, and that, as far as Desi was concerned, was the only source of light.

Before the girl could ask, the young servant left with a courteous bow, leaving the two stranded in the gloom. "Um…" Desi realized what the others must have thought about the two of them. "Did we ever say we were married?" she asked Carlos. "Because I don't think she's coming back."

The boy did not seem to hear her, because as soon as the servant left, he shook his head exasperatedly, groaned, and sank into the bed. He put his head in his hands as if he had a huge headache, and only muttered to himself. "I _can't_ believe I said that. Gandalf doesn't buy it one bit, and if we had been something else, we could have done so much more. We could have done so much more spying. Oh God…"

Desi realized what Carlos meant, and knew that they had to get down to business and review the lines said and cover up their lies. Also, she could not let her best friend fall into despair before they even experienced culture shock. "Don't worry about it," she told him. "Denethor won't get a chance to ask Théoden about us. He dies in the Battle of the Pelennor Fields. There's no way he can tell from the stables. Besides, he won't even pursue this ordeal; he's got too much on his mind already."

Carlos sighed again, but seemed a little more hopeful. "Yeah, but I didn't want to start off on a bad foot with _Gandalf_. How far away is the Battle of the Pelennor Fields anyway?"

"I don't know. Soon, I guess," she shrugged off the matter. "Was it just me or did Gandalf seem really creepy?"

The boy rolled his eyes and let out a dry laugh. "Ever since we got here, things have been really creepy. Everything seems _wrong._ It's like… they're the way Tolkien described them, but they're a little off. And Gandalf… well… he seemed more like an evil, mythological wizard than anything I thought him to be."

"Because you thought him to be almost grandfatherly, like Ian McKellen played him in the movies," she concluded, testing out the mattress of the bed. It was quite comfortable, but it was so soft that she was certain that her entire body would sink into the mattress if she put more than half of her weight onto the bed.

"Exactly. And… I don't know. Maybe I'm just a Shakespeare maniac, but did you hear Denethor quoting _Macbeth_?" Carlos asked.

"You too, huh?" the girl let out an exaggerated sigh. "I had no idea that Shakespeare was that influential. I mean, seriously, he's only supposed to be quoted _after_ he writes his works—"

"It's not funny, Desi," Carlos said quietly, and Desi shut up and stared at her friend in disbelief. She always knew that not everyone got her sense of humor, but Carlos always did, and he had always been indulgent with her even when she told horrible jokes. The gloom seemed to settle even closer now, and the girl swallowed. "He wasn't quoting. It was like… he was actually talking… you know… just saying regular words."

Desi shrugged, still not understanding why her friend was still brooding. Her shock had not worn off yet, and personally, she liked the sense of false euphoria. "Well, Shakespeare adopted all of his comedies from some of the funniest plays in Latin at that time. Who says he can't adopt certain lines as well?" When Carlos gave her a hard look and did not respond, she only sighed, this time a real one, and added quietly, "Let's review what the chronology of the story was supposed to be."

Carlos glanced out the balcony, the reddish light shining into the room made the curtains look more like blood than ever. The girl followed his gaze to the inky sky above the red clouds of fire in the distance. It seemed as if a constant storm raged in that area; it looked the same as it did the night before, but Mordor and Orodruin did not seem any less threatening in the morning sun. The girl sat down next to her friend and put a hand on his shoulder.. "I know, I know," she rolled her eyes. "Of all the rooms in Minas Tirith, we get the one facing Mordor, right?"

Carlos laughed at this, finally, and launched into the order of events according to Tolkien. Both of them had been raised on the works of that man, as their parents were fantasy freaks in their youth, and the two knew the story as if it was their own family history, though by no menas were they Tolkien scholars. "Okay, I'd say we're some time in early March. It's when the Rohirrim just won the Battle of Helm's Deep. Gandalf broke Saruman's staff not long ago, and no doubt, Pippin's already looked into the Palantir."

Desi loved how he could make everything make sense despite the fact that they were both a few millenniums behind their time, and the US government was somehow aiding Sauron in this whole plight about the One Ring.

Shaking her head, she decided to stop thinking about this, and continued where her friend had left off. "And what's supposed to happen is that after Gandalf takes Pippin to Gondor, Faramir loses Osgiliath to Mordor and his father implies that he wished Faramir had died instead of Boromir. In order to win his father's love, he goes and tries to retake the city, but is seriously wounded. The Rohirrim, meanwhile, are getting here with the help of the Wild Men, and Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli are taking the Paths of the Dead with the Dunadan and Elrond's sons. The Battle of the Pelennor Fields follows."

"And Denethor goes crazy because he believes that what he sees in the Palantir is going to come true, which in a way, it has," Carlos jumped right in. They knew this story backward and forward. "So he tries to kill Faramir and himself to save the pain, but only succeeds in suicide. The people of Middle-Earth win the Battle of the Pelennor Fields and tend to the wounded. Meanwhile, Gollum betrays Frodo and leads them up the Winding Stair at the entrance of Cirith Ungol. Shelob attacks Frodo, and Sam finds him paralyzed, so he thinks he's dead. He takes the ring, but has to hide when Orcs come, and he finds out from them that Frodo isn't really dead. The Orcs take Frodo, and Sam finds Frodo by dressing up as an Orc, and they go towards Mount Doom with the Ring. Then what?"

"Gandalf, meanwhile, tells the others to march to Mordor so they draw out Sauron's forces and so he's blind to everything else. This way, Frodo and Sam can destroy the Ring," she finished for him, still gazing at Mordor and the Ephel Duath.

"At least… that's what's supposed to happen," he almost whispered.

The girl looked up at her friend and got up and paced restlessly around the room. "You think that the government is going to tamper with that, don't you?" she finally asked. "That's why they're here? To make sure Sauron wins? But what do they get in return?"

The boy was silent. Mordor and its thunderous claims seemed more ominous in the non-verbal argument the boy seemed to have with himself in his head. Desi watched as several expressions came and left his face in such quick successions that it looked as if he was trying to stay still and a fly had just landed on his nose. She wanted to laugh because it looked hilarious, but something inside her told her that it was not the time to laugh and that things were going to become more serious than she had ever known.

Carlos's fingers made useless gestures, and the girl realized that he wanted to write his ideas down. He seemed older and more intense in the dim light, and the shadows across his face danced to the rhythm set out by the Fiery Chasm.

Wordlessly, so not to interrupt his thoughts, Desi reached inside her cloak and took a ballpoint pen from her Capri's pockets. Then, she stuck it in Carlos's right hand and rolled up his left shirtsleeve. Absently, he began to scribble in his spidery, illegible hand on his own arm, working consistently down.

The girl smiled and shook her head. Being much more into mathematics and history, she was also more organized than the boy. If she had not rolled up his sleeve, he would have started writing on his own clothes. Desi took a piece of parchment, which had a strange, leathery feel under her fingers, from the table and handed it to Carlos. He began doodling on that as well, and she muttered something about breakfast and walked out.

Carlos did not heed her and kept writing.

* * *


	6. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5

* * *

**

After the hastily eaten brunch that the maid brought in, Desi walked out of the room she and Carlos shared and moved to the open air. While Carlos seemed to be able to think anywhere by blocking out anything, she had to be alone with nothing to bother her. She leaned against the white walls above the buildings on the fifth level, and looked north. The marble felt strange under her hand, and she was suddenly very certain that it was made by some kind of magic. Being a scientific person and not at all ready to believe in anything other than the power of logic, she backed away hastily, and examined the wall. None of the soldiers paid her any mind, and she did not bother them and kept staring at the strange wall.

There was nothing particularly special about it when she first looked at it, but to the touch, it felt almost _sticky_. It was as if it wanted to hold onto her skin and not let go, but to the eye, it looked just like regular stone, and when she touched one hand to the other, there was no trace of the sticky substance. She tried to remember if it was Isildur or Anarion that built Minas Tirith, but found she could not.

Sighing in exasperation, she tried to play back everything that had happened since she got to Middle-Earth and stop thinking about the walls of Minas Anor. There was something other than the make of that ancient wall that that was nagging at the back of her mind.

She had hardly gotten to the middle of the report to the steward, however, when something tugged at her cloak. Thinking it must have been a child judging by where the pressure came from, Desi turned and looked down. She nearly jumped when her eyes landed on Pippin's innocent round face and curly brown hair. His blue eyes were full of fear and caution, but also curiosity and hope. J.R.R. Tolkien had been very accurate describing the hobbits indeed. This was exactly how she had pictured Pippin to be.

"Good morrow, little master," she tried to smile and put back on her British/Welsh accent at the same time. She was now very glad that she was a drama student. However, the hobbit did not seem so suspicious that she was afraid of him. "How may I help you?'

"Are you really of Rohan?" was the first question out of his mouth. She was taken aback by this bluntness, but recovered when she came with a fitting answer.

"Aye, and where are you of?"

"I am a hobbit from the Shire," was all he said, and Desi realized with a heavy heart that despite all of Pippin's innocence that he had started off with, he was learning tact in this cruel world, where Halflings were questioned for answers too readily given. No doubt, the trip with the Urûk-Hai had taught him to not be so free with his words. Pippin must have thought that she was cross-examining him. "Then King Théoden shall come?" he asked.

"Yes," she answered hastily, probably a little too much so, "if Gondor lights its beacon for help, Rohan will—" That was when it suddenly hit her and she realized what had been bothering her the entire day. "Angels and ministers of grace, defend us!" she interrupted herself, not realizing she was quoting _Hamlet_. She bit her lip and wanted to punch herself for not thinking about this sooner. Pippin started at this, and she apologized absentmindedly. "I cry thee mercy. I just remembered something, and I cannot stay. Perhaps a word some other time, Master Hobbit. "

She was sorry that she did not get to know the hobbit better, but she had to talk to Carlos again. Within minutes, she was back in the room and shaking Carlos from his reverie. Obviously, the poor boy was still thinking when she woke him.

"Carlos!" she cried, and plopped onto the bed next to him. "Oh my God, give me that pen and parchment—No! you're not getting it back until you listen to me—Hey! Ow!" The pen had ended up making a line across Desi's face, but fortunately, the parchment somehow landed on the mahogany table. The two were still fighting over the pen as the next few lines of dialogue escaped their mouths.

"What?!" the boy asked, annoyed. He hated to lose his train of thought, and his friend knew it, but this time, she was forced to do it.

"I'll tell you if you stop trying to shove that pen up my nostril!" she was just as annoyed now. She failed in getting the pen from him, as two years of swimming and a lifetime of clacking away on a keyboard had toned his arms and fingers to be much stronger than hers. "Fine!" she cried, and folded her arms. "But if Rohan doesn't come to the Battle of the Pelennor Fields and the West loses this battle, it's going to be your fault!"

That caught the boy's attention, and he hurriedly sat up and gave up the pen. "What?" he asked in alarm. "What are you talking about?"

Seeing that she had captured her audience's attention, Desi launched into her explanation and quickly forgave Carlos for nearly putting a ballpoint pen into her head. "I was just outside, and Pippin came up to me," she told him. "He asked if Rohan was going to come and help Gondor against Mordor, and I said that the Rohirrim would come, but only if the beacons were lit."

The boy caught on immediately, and once again, Desi was very glad that her best friend had a higher IQ than her and understood her even when she did not say everything. "The beacons aren't lit, like they were in the book!" he cried. "But… what about the Red Arrow?"

Desi's brows furrowed. "That's what happened in the book, right? But did you see Denethor? Did he look like the type of person that would go and ask for help like that? The entire time, he didn't even pay attention to what I was saying! All he cared about was his dead son!"

The boy nodded, and muttered, "So we'll have to pull a Pippin."

"A Pippin?" she asked. "What?"

"In the movie," he patiently explained, "the beacons weren't lit when Gandalf came to speak with Denethor like in the book. He warns Denethor that if he does not light the beacons, it will be too late. However, the steward doesn't listen so Gandalf tells Pippin to sneak up to the guard tower of Minas Tirith and light the beacon. The guards at Amon Din see this, and burn their beacon, and soon, a chain reaction happens."

She raked a hand through her untidy and unwashed hair and seemed to think. "I remember it," she told him, "but Pippin's about half our size, and it was a movie. How do you think we're going to get past those guards?"

Carlos hesitated and scratched his chin, where a little stubble was coming in. The girl had always thought it was kind of cute and mercilessly teased him about how he was finally becoming a "man." "Well, we could always get Pippin to do it for us," he raised an eyebrow. Then, his eyes lit up and he smiled. "We could definitely get Pippin to do it for us? Why not?"

But Desi shook her head and began to finger the soft velvet curtains. Though they felt good to touch, they were so heavy that she could not lift them even if she used both hands. She wondered if Denethor wore the same type of velvet under his furs, and shuddered at the thought of him wearing something like that in the summer.

"No," she finally said. "That poor hobbit has been through enough. He's had to travel all the way here from the Shire through snow, deserts, and forests, get picked up by a group of nasty Urûk-Hai, then separate from his best friend. His innocence is wearing thin, and he doesn't know whom he can trust. He will never agree to this."

Her best friend sighed and got up and began to pace. His tunic swished around on his body, as his belt had come loose. The hose, however, fit him perfectly, and the girl could not help but stifle a snicker as he walked around with the tunic coming open and the tights giving away every detail of his legs. "What?" He had heard the muffled sound escape Desi's lips.

"You look ridiculous in that tunic and hose," was all she could manage. He narrowed her eyes at her and puffed out his lower lip in a mock pout. It was only seconds before they both burst out into laughter.

****

Desi felt comical tiptoeing to the highest pinnacle of the White City with Carlos in tow, holding two stolen pieces of flint to his chest as if they were invaluable pieces from King Tut's tomb. "I'm telling you yet again," she whispered as they smiled their way past the guards. "They have fire near the beacon. They have to. It's their warning signal."

Carlos nudged her harshly in the ribs. "And _I'm_ telling you," he muttered, his lips stretched from ear to ear in a manic smile, "we have to be ready just in case." Desi could not help but begin to laugh again as they got past the guards, who did not give them so much a look of suspicion as a look of slight amusement.

"Okay, okay," she gasped between giggles. "You can take that grin off of your face. I have the uncanny feeling that if you don't at this second, it'll be forever etched into your skull." Carlos spent the next few minutes scaring her with the expression, then became serious and painfully pulled his face into place.

"Um…" he asked. "So where exactly is that pinnacle for the beacon?"

The girl seemed magically more aware in Minas Tirith than him and looked towards the end of the Great Hall, facing away from the Silent Street. Their backs were to Mordor, and the boy fidgeted to let such a great power have his advantage. "There," she pointed at the guard tower. If she had not pointed it out, he would have missed it, for it was an obscure building directly behind the gargantuan hall.

"That's it?" he said with contempt. "How is anyone supposed to see it? And how did you find it?"

"It stands out," she told him. He shrugged, but did not understand her reasoning. However, he realized that she had a better eye than he did because her mother had been an aspiring artist before her parents were divorced. She tried to explain, "It's made of wood. Everything else is made of stone." He raised an eyebrow, and still couldn't tell how she found this out, for the wood was not brown but the gray of rot. He was afraid that if they set the beacon on fire, that the entire thing would collapse. The girl seemed to read his mind. "Don't worry," she assured him. "That's only the outside. Inside, around and under the beacon, it's stone."

"What are we waiting for then?" he asked. "Let's go."

Getting to the top of the guard tower was not as hard a task as Carlos had at first thought. Desi told him to guard under the tower to see if any soldiers were coming (they were not in the view of the Guards of the Citadel) and swiftly began climbing the intricate stairs that led up to the top. However, when she reached the top, she remembered that the flints were still with her friend.

"Oh, spite!" she cursed to herself, but then, realized that there was indeed an oil lamp directly above the pile of wood. She wondered what would happen if one of the beacons accidentally lighted itself during a time of peace. _Knowing these people_, she thought. _They'd get their panties all up in a bunch over it._ However, she was not thinking about consequences when she clumsily climbed up the stack of wood and got the bowl of oil. Unfortunately, just like Pippin in the movies, she spilt most of it. Then, getting as low as she could but still able to reach the summit of the woodpile, she threw the lantern upside down on the pile and jumped down, not wanting to be caught in the blaze. The roar of the flames came from above.

She could only remember once when her heart had beat this fast, and that meant a lot to her, because being in drama and dance, she had gotten over stage fright long ago. Racing down the stairs, she pulled on Carlos' arm. "Let's go!" Desi cried. "We can't be seen here now that it's up!"

The boy barely had time to acknowledge what happened before they heard cries come up from the Silent Street. "Guards!" he hissed, and the two looked at each other in panic. "Um… here!" He pulled Desi over behind a large wooden beam that supported the middle of the watchtower. As soon as they were hidden, footsteps could be heard rushing from the fountain and the White Tree.

"The beacon!" Desi heard voices cry out. "The beacon is lit!" Then, within seconds, one voice rose up, "Look!" There followed many more cries, and the girl made out in the middle of it one sentence, "The beacon of Amon Din is lit!"

There was then a hurried argument about what happened, where the culprits were, and whether this should be told to the steward or not. Through this, the two teenagers crouched down in the shadows of the beam, trying to be as small as possible and not breathe too loudly. Desi's heart was racing a mile a minute and the blood rushing past her ears made her nearly deaf. Her lungs screamed for air, and she realized that she had been holding her breath the entire time.

She let it out and immediately gulped in another mouthful, but nearly cried out when she realized that hiss of air was audible to everyone, as the guards had fallen silent. Shouts came up, and suddenly, the two friends found themselves surrounded by Guards of the Citadel, in their mithril helms with long cheek guards and feathered wings. Each bore a long spear, and at their waists, they all carried another sword. Their armor was made completely of a mithril, Desi knew, and it glinted in the wild light of the flames above them; the sun had not shown its face yet. A white tree was emblazoned on each of their body armor, and a long dress of chain mail hung beneath it.

Before either of them could say a word, a thicket of spears flashed, and pointed at their throats. They were so tight that Desi and Carlos could not even exchange a look of fear. One guard in particular, stepped forward, his spear not pointed, but his facial features were unclear because of his helm. "Who art thou?" he asked. "And what meanst thou by lighting the beacon?" When neither answered, he pursed his lips and growled, "Speak!"

Another guard stepped away from the thicket of weapons and nudged the captain as if telling him to do something. "Demand!" he told him.

Carlos gulped, "We'll answer."

Desi wanted to roll her eyes at this sudden outburst of Shakespeare. Obviously, these people loved _Macbeth_. "We did not light the beacon," she lied through her teeth, and knew that none of them would believe her. "But an thou believe we did, then take us where we may be judged," she added quickly so that they might believe her. Carlos had been right. She was a horrible liar.

She felt him squeeze her arm, but she did not change her tone, and the captain of the guards seemed to consider this. Then, nodding, he answered, "Let it be so. Heaven knows what thou hadst known."


	7. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6

* * *

**

Pippin, still a little confused as why the woman from Rohan had left him so quickly, strode up and down the streets of Minas Tirith, completely lost and at a loss for words. He had never seen a city so great, and yet, he had never seen a city so empty and cold. However, after more than a quarter of an hour of wandering about aimlessly, a sound coming from the direction of the gates to the upper levels caught his attention.

Seeing that many of the people outside their houses were gathering to see this spectacle despite their fear, the little hobbit decided to go over and have a look as well. "After all," he said to himself, "Gandalf has wanted me to look into the wide world. Why not start with a little scuffle in the White City?"

With that, he pushed his way through the crowd, ducking elbows, money pouches, and whatever else rained down upon someone of his height when in a group of men and women all nearly twice his height. To his surprise, in the middle of the group, he saw a rabble of guards and Gandalf, standing stoutly with his staff raised, arguing heatedly. He struggled to see what they were arguing about, but just then, he was pushed back by a couple of old wives who are always the first to know about these gossips.

Forcing his way back in, he looked around again and saw that a small group of soldiers a little way off were holding under custody the two Rohirrim messengers that he had seen in the hall of Denethor. _What_, he wondered, _had they done to deserve that? And hadn't the woman told me she had forgotten something? Was it what she had forgotten that got the two in such trouble?_

These thoughts swam around inside Pippin's head, and he felt as if there were flies buzzing around his brain, trying to get out of his skull and quickly dismissed these thoughts before his skull actually burst. Above the racket the crowd was making, he tried to make out Gandalf and the guards' words.

"I am telling thou, we must take these foul liars to the dungeons," one exceptionally burly guard was almost yelling at Gandalf. "It is the order of our liege, the steward."

The wizard seemed equally impatient and angry, and Pippin stared in wonder at how the guard could possibly have the will to fight back. He knew that _he_ would never want to face an angry wizard in his life. "And _I'm_ telling thou," Gandalf was saying, "that these two have done no harm and therefore must be freed. Dost thou wish for the Rohirrim to get word that the hospitality of Gondor has lessened to lodging messengers in prisons?"

The Guards of the Citadel argued back, and finally, in need of haste, the wizard threw up his staff so that the guards in front of him parted as if invisible hands were pushing them out of Gandalf's way. Then, he marched over to where the two young messengers were held and repeated his act with the staff. Only the two remained standing, as the other soldiers fell backwards rather awkwardly.

"Come," Pippin heard the wizard in an abrasive fashion. "Thou hadst not the time nor the privilege to argue with me." Then, as if they were being pursued by the Orcs of Mordor, the two followed the wizard towards, what Pippin realized, was the room Gandalf and he shared, and soon, the three were out of sight.

"Now that's a strange thing and no mistake," the hobbit said to himself again, and biting his lower lip, decided to pursue the three.

He came, puffing and panting, into his room just in time to see Gandalf pacing up and down the length of the floor, from the stone balcony to the edge of his bed. The two messengers sat quite still, with ashen faces, on Pippin's little futon. They were completely still, and Pippin suddenly realized something: these two looked nothing like the Rohirrim that he had seen riding up to Isengard with Gandalf. Those men had been proud, with long, flaxen hair and blue or gray eyes that matched their demeanor.

The woman, or rather, girl, had long, flowing black hair that reached past her shoulders. Her skin was tinted gold with an olive undertone, quite unlike the Rohirrim's pale, fair skin. She had large, almond-shaped eyes that were exotic to Pippin, and her nose was not as tall as the Rohirrim's, and was broader.

The boy had short, ill-cut blond hair that seemed to stick out of the top of his head. He had green eyes, much to the like of the elves, and at first glance, Pippin knew how he had mistaken him for a Rohirrim. However, he lacked the agility of the horse lords, and most importantly, he did not carry about him the smell of the horses.

Gandalf seemed to have already gotten answers from these two impersonators and did not notice that the hobbit had returned. The other two, however, turned to look at the Halfling, and he saw that their looks were not unkind, only wondering.

The wizard turned back to the two, still ignoring the hobbit and almost growled. "So, if you are not of Rohan, then the Rohirrim will not come?" It seemed as if the interrogation had just started.

The girl took a deep breath and rubbed her temples in impatience. Pippin could not help but hold back a smile. He had never seen anyone impatient with Gandalf. "Oh, please, Gandalf," she answered in a bored voice. The hobbit nearly jumped. Her accent was completely different from the one she had used when she had spoken to Denethor and himself. The wizard seemed just as alarmed, and she batted this discovery off with an irritated hand gesture. "Yes, this is how I really speak," she rolled her eyes, and the hobbit noticed that her air of formality was gone as well. "It was all an act for Denethor. You're right that we're not Rohirrim, but that does not mean that the Rohirrim will not come."

"What meanst thou?" the wizard asked suspiciously.

"And you're supposed to be someone who _thinks_," the girl muttered to herself, and Pippin wanted to burst out laughing. Her sarcasm was beginning to unnerve the wizard, who was very seldom unnerved. "We're not Rohirrim, but they will come once the beacons of Gondor are lit. They know that their neighbors need help."

When the wizard still looked perplexed, the boy put a hand on the girl's arm. "Maybe we should explain," he told her, and she nodded. Pippin suddenly had a strange feeling that their story was going to be much stranger than his own of leaving the Shire and traveling to Gondor.

* * * *

Carlos sat back on the bed and sighed in relief, finishing the last part of their tale. Gandalf, though he was not the one that Tolkien or Jackson had envisioned, still seemed to be one that could be trusted, Shakespearean language and all. He did not once interrupt the two in their rather confusing jumble of a story, each one interrupting the other and adding on little details that had been missed. The only sign the wizard showed that he was listening was when he frowned at their successful attempt to light the beacon of Minas Tirith.

The two teens had had a whole conversation in silence with each other at whether or not they should tell Gandalf of what they discovered about the United States' government, but in the end, decided that it was for the best that these people knew. After all, they might know what the US was after, as Carlos and Desi were still not exactly familiar with the landscapes of Middle-Earth, despite growing up with the book.

When they finished this last part of their account, Desi saw that Pippin was not gaping at them or even looking with incredulity. She could understand this; if she was a hobbit that had left the Shire, met with Urûk-Hai, talking trees, and then left to her own devices in the domains of a downcast wizard, she would find nothing particularly new either. Gandalf, however, whom she was sure had much more experience than this, studied them with a subtler eye.

"So thou art of the time to come?" the wizard finally spoke, and Desi realized that his face had gone quite pale. His voice was hoarser than before, and he stood very still; even his wild hair seemed to have calmed down as well.

"Yes, the future," the girl answered, nodded, apparently unaware of the danger of saying something like this. Her voice was full of honesty and innocence that he was forced to believe at least that much of their tale.

Carlos looked hesitant, but seeing his friend agree so furtively, he had no choice but to nod as well, though he was burning to say something else.

"And thou sayest that thy governing body has come to Middle-Earth to aid the Dark Lord?" the wizard asked, his eyes narrowing. Pippin looked thoughtful at this as well, and realized that his legs were aching terribly; he had been standing next to the door during this entire time, listening to the two strangers recount their story. He pulled up one of the heavy wooden chairs and sat gloomily, not knowing why his head was buzzing with warning signs.

Desi began to nod again, like a bobble head, but caught herself, realizing the tone Gandalf was using. "We are _not_ spies," she told him firmly, ignoring Carlos' roll of his eyes. Sometimes, she was much too naïve for her own good. "I know all of this sounds very strange and impossible, and we _are_ from the United States, but we're not with the government." Her friend had wanted to stop her from saying more, as he did not think it wise to blab everything they knew to a wizard they had thought, until a day ago, was only from a very well-written fantasy.

Pippin bit his lip and spoke for the first time, not knowing what was compelling him to do so. "Your words are fair, and you seem fair. This government you speak of seems foul and in aiding the Dark Lord, _is_ foul. But how do we not know that fair is foul and foul is fair?"

The two strangers exchanged a glance that the hobbit could not read. It was one of surprise, perhaps at his words, but it was also a knowing look, as if his words were familiar to them. People, especially the Big Folk, of the future must be very strange indeed to be able to give each other such stares of oxymoron. Pippin then looked to Gandalf, the wizard he knew so well and yet seemed to not know at all after his change to being Gandalf the White. To his surprise, he was looking at him with delight and pride.

Well, at least Gandalf's happy with you, the hobbit thought. And that's something, if nothing else is.

The two humans seemed to have nothing to say to Pippin's words, and wizard took this advantage to begin to interrogate them again. "What are thy names? And speak truth: what is thy purpose here?"

The two looked at each other again, and Pippin saw, that with their eyes, they agreed to something in silence. They must be married or _very_ good friends, the hobbit noted, though they are very young. He remembered when he and Merry had agreed in the same way, so long ago, in the Shire, to steal one of Gandalf's fireworks. That was during old Bilbo's 111th birthday party. He must have only been in his teens then… a mischievous little hobbit, no doubt, but content and ignorant of the wide world. He wondered if he wanted that bliss again.

"My name is Carlos Miller," the boy stated. The hobbit guessed, despite his height and voice, he had not come of age yet. "This is my friend, Desiree Song. We are not spies for the US, and we were telling the truth when we said that we have no purpose here. We do not even know how we came here."

The girl named Desiree raised an eyebrow, but said nothing, thinking that it be wiser if she shut up.

"If thou art of the future, no doubt thou hadst more comforts and luxuries than we do," the wizard was unrelenting, pummeling the pair time and time again. "Wherefore dost thy governing body need to come here, to Middle-Earth? What do they want?"

Desiree sighed in exasperation, and despite her wit and sarcasm before, Peregrin Took thought she would collapse under the weight of Gandalf's questions. "We were hoping you could tell us," she finally intoned gloomily. She did not look like a liar, only as a child who had been put through too much wears and problems.

The hobbit was uncannily reminded of Frodo when he first saw him in Rivendell, after the Lord Elrond had healed him of the wound from the Morgul blade.


End file.
